wrennie, one thing i am thinking a LOT about right now, thanks to all your observations & fotos of the different Nests this year, & AJL*s teachings of what to watch for on the web cam, is how much repetition there is in the behaviour of the Eaglets from year to year.i remember photographing last year*s Trimblet on the SAME branch as you are photographing this year*s on.& i am thinking how on the web cam Nest, the Eaglets start by attaining the close up cam box - the equivalent of a branch, to them - & then go for the farther out branches of the Nest Tree, the Stump & the wide angle cam box.There is a learning curve, & it is repeated from year to year, & is taught to them by Mums Dads!!

Hi Booni, I just learned you may have a photo of a possible more recent siting of Hope. If you do and can post the link or photo here, I would just love to see it and several others on chat have expressed great interest too. Thank you kindly, Bluewing

WrenGitchi miigwetch for your observations and the time it takes you to correlate and post this for us to all see and learn from. I guess that all neighbors on Hornby take care of the eagles that are near their homes....what a great thing to hear!! It is such a gift to have these ground observations of all of the nests on Hornby. Again....I greatly appreciate your time and expertise!!

Logged

"Our true enemies, as well as our true sources of strength, lie within."

Hiya there Bluewing!Here is the link to my Hope album.If you hover your mouse over the little pictures, you will see a title & date show up.Click on the foto you want to view, then click it again to see the different sizes.The top row of the group of fotos, december 18 2009 is a series of fotos of whom i believe is Hope.The bottom two rows also contain fotos of an Eagle i believe to be Hope.

This map sums up our observations of the nests of Hornby Island for the summer of 2011. The information was collected from direct observation by Booni and myself, and from conversations with the nests' neighbours.Click on the map to see the larger size, and click again to explore details.

This year, I added the information about "unsuccessful nesting attempts" to get closer to the format used by WiTS. So, a green pin with no number on it means that the nest was worked on and the territory occupied, but no eaglets were born. I also added white pins to indicate the nests whose status this year is unknown. This year we did not have time to check all the nests before the eaglets flew.Transparent pins still indicate unoccupied nests and former nesting sites. Not all the former nesting sites are on this map, only those that I am familiar with.The map is busier because I included the stats from last year. The labels give the nests' name, and then the stats for 2010. I used blue pins in 2010, so the blue dots indicate that the nest was occupied, and the numbers beside them show the number of eaglets that year.

There were about 20 occupied nests on Hornby Island this year, and about 22 eaglets were born. (I shall qualify those numbers shortly.) This compares with 22 occupied nests last year (I'm counting Nest #24, which qualified as a "nesting attempt") and 30 eaglets.

We were unable to obtain information on the status of the Seawright nest and the Olsen Farm nest. So it's possible that the number of nests is actually as high as last year. The eaglet count could also be correspondingly higher.Nests #5 and #8 are a special problem of their own: both are in thick forest, on private land that we do not have access to. The owners are unsure of the nests' exact locations; some or the perch trees are visible, but the eaglets are only heard, and not seen. It is even possible that both nests are on the same territory and only one at a time is in use. The number of eaglets at the Lunar Rock nest is an unconfirmed guess; we do know that the Lunar Rock pair were incubating eggs.

There were no fatalities this year, but one eaglet (Nest #22) was too weak to fly and went to rehab. This compares with 3 fatalities and 3 rehabs last year.

In 2010, we were aware of only one unsuccessful nesting attempt: Nest #24. This year, 4 nests were without issue. Of these, we know that Shingle Spit, Phipps Point and Brigantine did not incubate any eggs, based on the behaviour of the eagle pairs in the spring. The territories were occupied until early summer. We have no detailed information from the other unsuccessful nesting attempt, at Heron Rocks.

ps: I will re-take the photo when I can set up under better light... this will have to do for now.

Oh wow! I just moved my mouse and the scroll bar around and looked at each one - I also marvel at the work that you all have done. If I added up the times that I want to hug you both, I would need to get out a calculator and sit down for an hour!

This anecdote is from Denman Island, but it answers a question I've had for several years about our local nests.

The question is this: do eagles ever return to a nest after abandoning it? In other words: if an eagle pair moves from nest A to nest B, is their next move invariably to a new nest C, or do they ever return to nest A?

We have suspected that this may have been the case with Nests #16-17-18-19, but as far as I know it has never been proven. The nests are in thick forest and difficult to see from the ground.

A young man who I used to work with told me this story. There is a nest right by this young man's house. He can see it from a window of his house. A pair of eagles lived there for years, but last summer they moved. They built a new nest in another tree a few hundred feet away.The eagles were not able to raise a clutch in that nest. They were on the nest in the spring, but no eaglets appeared. The neighbours cut some trees around incubation time, and my friend thinks that this disturbed the brooding process. Still, the eagles maintained the territory and the nest through the summer.

Now the eagles have returned from the salmon rivers. And they have started bringing branches to their first nest! My friend can again watch them from his window.